This flight report is from last year. We had to go to Bukoba in Northwest Tanzania, near the Ugandan border, for a site visit. We actually flew on Auric Air Services from Mwanza to Bukoba, but since neither Auric or Bukoba is listed in the database, I have this tagged as Fastjet (we flew Fastjet from Dar es Salaam to Mwanza) and from Mwanza to Mwanza.
We had to leave our hotel at 4am to catch the 6am Fastjet flight from Dar for a 7:30am arrival into Mwanza. I'm not going to report on that flight as I (and most everyone else) slept through the flight. Luckily the flight arrived on time as we had to take our luggage to a separate Auric Air building a few minutes away. They told us that we were too late to check in but since there were seven of us, they reluctantly allowed us get on the flight.
Our ride.
It was open seating on the flight and it was full. One of my colleagues sat in the front next to the pilot, who also did the safety demonstration from his seat.
The flight took us over Lake Victoria.
We landed in Bukoba, where the airport is right on the lake. As soon as we got off the plane we were swarmed by lake flies. We all enjoyed some extra protein as we made our way into the terminal.
I wish I could include a few tourist shots but really there is nothing really worth seeing in Bukoba. I will say that the sunrises are beautiful. We stayed in a 'hotel' on a hill that overlooked the lake.
After three days we headed back to Dar via Mwanza. Our pickup at the hotel was late and we were worried that we were going to miss our 6:45am flight but the staff at the hotel told us not to worry as the pilot was still asleep :)
At check is, we noticed that there were a few women who were bringing aboard buckets of water. We jokingly called this fish water as it smelt pretty repulsive and we couldn't figure out why anyone would want to bring these buckets into the cabin (clearly TSA in not enforcing the 100mL rule in Bukoba).
We arrived in Mwanza and made the reverse mad dash to the Fastjet terminal to check in for our flight to Dar.
Even with a limited number of pictures, an archive report on this kind of flight is a trip in an other world.
Thanks for sharing !
Thanks for sharing this exotic report! Airline and Airport have been added to the database and to your report. Sorry it took so long. Thanks for sharing!
As soon as we got off the plane we were swarmed by lake flies => Yes, so typical from the rainy season and very annoying!
the staff at the hotel told us not to worry as the pilot was still asleep Pole pole rafiki :-)
we noticed that there were a few women who were bringing aboard buckets of water => Buckets usually do contain fishes (Daaga and/or tilapia) that are extremely cheap compared to what can be found on the seaside!
Very nice report, looking forward to more